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Surrey Hills Wood Fuel Conference 4 th October 2013

Surrey Hills Wood Fuel Conference 4 th October 2013. EXPLODING THE MYTHS ABOUT SUSTAINABLE WOOD FUEL. Professor Roland Clift, Emeritus Professor of Environmental Technology Centre for Environmental Strategy University of Surrey .

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Surrey Hills Wood Fuel Conference 4 th October 2013

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  1. Surrey Hills Wood Fuel Conference 4th October 2013 EXPLODING THE MYTHS ABOUT SUSTAINABLE WOOD FUEL Professor Roland Clift, Emeritus Professor of Environmental Technology Centre for Environmental Strategy University of Surrey

  2. “ ……wood-scavengers can burn wood. But there is not enough wood for everyone to do so. For forest-dwellers, there’s wood. For everyone else, there’s heat pumps.” David Mackay: Sustainable Energy - without the hot air”. p.153

  3. Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution

  4. CARBON DIOXIDE CONCENTRATION AND TEMPERATURE: EVIDENCE FROM ICE CORES

  5. Each of the last three decades has been successively warmer at the earth’s surface than any proceeding decade since 1850…warming of the climate system is unequivocal... human influence on the climate system is clear. [Global surface temperature change by 2050 is likely to exceed 1.5 degrees C.] Source: IPCC 5thAssessment Report 2013

  6. ENERGY THE SYSTEM VIEW CLIMATE CHANGE WATER FOOD Everything is interconnected….

  7. ENERGY THE SYSTEM VIEW Human Population: 10 billion CLIMATE CHANGE WATER FOOD Everything is interconnected….

  8. THE CARBON CHALLENGE: • Keep CO2(eq.) in the atmosphere to 450 ppm • Aim for a global temperature rise of 2 degrees but plan for at least 4 degrees • Implies reducing UK GHG emissions by 80% by 2050

  9. The debate over nuclear power should not obscure the more significant and urgent issues of fixing the buildings and developing the biomass energy sector (Clift, Sinclair and Johnsson, Parliamentary Monitor, July 2006) The technology need is for small-scale biomass-fired combined-heat-and-power plants or heat-only plants which are efficient and reliable.

  10. IS BIOENERGY RENEWABLE? Part of the renewable carbon cycle in principle but • Some fossil energy may be used for transport and processing • Greenhouse Gases (GHGs) may be emitted when land use changes Therefore it is necessary to evaluate the fuel supply chain using Life Cycle Assessment

  11. COPPICED WILLOW PROMOTES BIODIVERSITY

  12. TYPICAL YIELDS FOR PERENNIAL CROPS: SRC (willow or poplar) 10-30 Miscanthus 10-18 Switch grass 7-14 Plant breeding may increase yields or enable use of lower quality land. Figures (in ODT/ha/yr), from Rothamsted Research (TSEC-Biosys consortium) (Oven-dry tonnes per hectare per year)

  13. ALTERNATIVE USES OF BIOMASS • Direct Firing: - Power, heat, CHP • Conversion - to biogas (AD) - to liquid fuels - to high value products

  14. LIFE CYCLE OF A BIOFUEL EMISSIONS: CO2, N2O, etc. CO-PRODUCTS LAND USE CHANGE ENERGY EMISSIONS AGROCHEMICALS & FUELS FOSSIL FUELS

  15. “SECOND GENERATION” BIOFUELS Energy Release Combustion products BIOMASS Transport Losses Energy Release Energy Input Refined products BIOMASS Energy input

  16. “… processing biomass into liquid transport fuels is rarely an optimal strategy; if biomass is to be highly processed, it should be transformed into much higher value products. Furthermore, the increasing availability of shale gas is changing the energy sector; the possibility of making liquid fuels from natural gas puts the whole development of transport biofuels into question. Thus it is possible for a process to be technologically clever but strategically ill-considered. What the world needs, far more urgently than second- or third-generation biofuel technologies, is small-scale reliable biomass-fired CHP plant.” Roland Clift, 2012

  17. CONCLUSIONS BASED ON ENERGY YIELD AND CARBON OFFSET PER HECTARE (not quite UK biomass strategy): Hierarchy in UK: biomass heating, particularly residential and institutional CHP co-fired electrical generation dedicated biomass power plant transport fuels You only get to transport biofuels when the other demands have been met – local niche markets only.

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